GG: Gould and the Juilliard Quartet

[Eberhard Buehler <ebuehler@nando.net>]

The last concert in this year's Duke University Chamber Arts series was by 
the Juilliard String Quartet.  This season marked the 50th anniversary of 
the Chamber Arts series and coincidentally it is also the 50th anniversary 
of the Juilliard.  The president of Duke joined in hosting a reception 
after the concert to celebrate the dual anniversaries.  I made a beeline 
for first violinist Robert Mann, the only original member of the Quartet, 
to ask him about his experience with Glenn Gould, since I remembered Mann 
was in the Juilliard for the recorded performance with Gould of the 
Schumann Opus 47 and Schoenberg's Ode to Napoleon Bonaparte.  However, Mann 
was besieged with old friends, former students and even former teachers(!), 
and I was lucky to get just a minute or two of his time.  I asked him if he 
had ever played with Gould and to my amazement he instantly recalled both 
pieces and said they had also done other things together that were not 
released.  I wish I could have had a little more time with him.  Supposedly 
Gould had had some disagreements with the Juilliard about interpretation of 
the Schumann, but I didn't get a chance to ask Mann about that.  When I 
told him that I had become a big Gould fan, he said he could well 
understand that. And that was the end of that.

Incidentally, the program included Hindemith's Quartet No. 2, Opus 10.  In 
honor of Hindemith's 100th birthday, the Juilliard performed all of his 
quartets this season.  They ended with Beethoven's Opus 135.  It was 
without a doubt the best I had ever heard it -- transcendingly beautiful.  
I did say that to Mann and he waxed rhapsodic about this particular period 
in Beethoven's musical output.

Eberhard Buehler